Living in NYC and traveling whenever – and wherever – I can.

Pinterest Projects: Marshmallow Reindeer

Are you on Pinterest? It is, hands down, one of my favorite ways to waste time. I’ve been on it for about 10 months now, and I’ve amassed a nice little collection of about 2,000 pins in that time. However, one thing that occurred to me recently is that people (myself included) probably spend hours (and hours) on there pinning things but never actually doing those things. I mean, think of all the clothes we never buy, the food we never cook, and the crafty projects we never make. Isn’t that kind of sad? Pinterest is supposed to be a place to curate inspiration, but is something really inspiring if it doesn’t inspire you to do anything?

So, it’s my goal (as time permits) to start actually taking some of my Pinterest inspirations and making them a reality in my everyday life (and blogging about them, of course). And since I got this idea in December, there’s probably no better place to start than Christmas goodies, right?

I mentioned yesterday that my family hosted the big family Christmas party this year. Quite a few of my cousins are still young, so I thought it would be cool to make some treats that would be fun for them. I found these reindeer on Pinterest – fashioned from marshmallows and chocolate – and knew they would be perfect (the original source is here).

They weren’t that difficult to make, but they do take a bit of finesse, especially with the pretzel antlers. I had a couple incidents that involved precariously-balanced pretzel antlers falling off, fingers covered in hot melted chocolate trying to fix said antlers, and me yelling in frustration. But overall, it wasn’t bad.

My general process for making the reindeer (slightly different from the linked instructions) was to dip the marshmallow – generously – in the melted chocolate, hold the stick horizontally and attach the eyes/nose (hold it in that position for awhile as to avoid a reindeer face melting catastrophe a la Raiders of the Lost Ark), stick it in the foam, and then attach the pretzel antlers. It took awhile to perfect that routine, but once I did, it was relatively smooth sailing.

Here’s a closer look at the reindeer-making process –

My assembly line (make sure to have all this set up in advance, before you melt your chocolate):